Questions?

Please direct any questions about the game to:

Lou Coatney, ELCOAT@Hotmail.com or CL52@yahoo.com
626 Western Ave., Macomb IL 61455

Cataloging in Publication:

Coatney, Louis Robert, 1946-
German Eagle vs. Russian Bear: A World War II Russian Front boardgame kit. 2d ed. [game] Juneau, AK: Louis R. Coatney, copyright 1993.
ii, 22p. rules folder, map in two parts, 1 sheet of pieces, 2 charts, a note to teachers. Bibliography, p. 19.

1. World War, 1939-1945--Campaigns--Soviet Union. 2. Soviet Union--History--German occupation, 1941-1944. 3. War games. 4. Educational games. I. Title.

D764.C632g 1993
940.542 COATNEY

GERMAN EAGLE VS. RUSSIAN BEAR is dedicated as a token of remembrance, gratitude, and respect to the Polish, Russian, and other Eastern European and Soviet peoples who were our Second World War Allies and who suffered, endured, and contributed so much for Allied Victory over Nazism.

II. Introduction:

GERMAN EAGLE VS. RUSSIAN BEAR is an educational 2-player strategic simulation game modeling the historical decision-making situations of the Axis and Soviet commands on the Russian Front -- or The Great Patriotic War, as the Soviets memorialize it -- from the time of the Nazi invasion in 1941 to the liberation of Soviet territory in 1944. Short, hour-long scenarios, depicting the most critical phases of the war -- such as the first defeat of Blitzkrieg in 1941-42 -- can be used.
Indeed, it is the early defensive/counteroffensive battles of the Second World War which many historians feel are the greatest Allied victories. In England and America, for example, the Battle of Britain, the back-and-forth battles in North Africa, the Soviet derailment of the German war machine in Russia, the dramatic naval Battle of Midway, and the brutal land, naval, and air battles around Guadalcanal are most often studied. Although students may find themselves serving as Ais commanders in military history games -- sinking Allied ships, for example -- this is accepted in the spirit of learning.
GERMAN EAGLE VS. RUSSIAN BEAR can be used as an instructional aid in history classes -- the intended purpose of its 1987 publication by the U.S. Educational Resources Information Center (ERIC) -- or as a standard game (using the 1941-42 scenario) in tournaments. In either case, the "Game Analysis and Results Form" should be used.
The scale of GERMAN EAGLE VS. RUSSIAN BEAR is one month of real time per game-turn, 140 miles/240 kms per hexagon width and corps/army/front (50,000-250,000 men) in unit level. Like the Soviet T34 tank, this historical game was conceived to be of simple manufacture, but of superior design, having the essential decision-making variables of the campaign's military operations.
Although such a game can be highly absorbing and uniquely educational, its players should never forget the grief and destruction which accompanied the invasion. It is estimated that 27 million Soviet men, women, and children died in this holocaust. Nevertheless, the player commanding the Axis forces should do his/her best in the game, to show the gravity of the Nazi military threat and the greatness of its historic defeat by the peoples of the Soviet Union.
LRC

III. Components:

• A. The mapsheet: After trimming the 2 map segments with scissors, they should be taped together. Colored pencil and fine-point porous-tipped pens can highlight map features -- if used with caution. See Rules Illustration #1 for a key to various terrain symbols and features.
• B. The unit pieces and markers: The sheets of units and markers should be mounted on cardboard. The usual adhesion method is a coating of rubber cement applied and held until tacky on both surfaces to be joined. (White paper glue works also, if applied very thinly.) Marking the bottom of Axis units black and Soviet units red -- before cutting them out -- can be vital, to differentiate flipped/Dispersed units. See Rules Illustration #2 for a key to unit and marker formats and symbols.
• C. A few key definitions of terms in the rules:
  • Attacker: The player whose player-turn (and movement and attack initiative) it is.
  • Combat [strength] Factor: Arbitrary units of combat strength used to calculate relative combat strengths and battle results.
  • Defender: The player whose player-turn (and movement and attack initiative) it isn't.
  • Hex: Any one hexagonal space on the mapboard, without reference to the terrain inside it or along its "hex-side."
  • Owning Player: The player to whom a unit in question belongs.
• D. Charts and tables: These are found on a separate sheet. Put them in see-through plastic for marking the Turn Record Track with grease pencil, if you wish.
• E. Randomizer: You will have to supply your own randomizer -- six-sided, marked "1" to "6," and usually referred to as a single die (of dice).

IV. Victory conditions:
To win the game, a player must be able to trace a supply line into each of the total number of victory cities indicated for him on the Victory Determination Table during any one of his Victory Determination Phases -- VDPs -- which occur toward the end of the opposing player's player-turns. This number can be modified by Rules V.A.1.a. or X.A.1.c.3.
Each of the following 10 cities are "victory cities": Leningrad (104), Warsaw (401), Moscow (406), Gorki (408), Kiev (603), Ploesti (801), Sevastopol (1003), Rostov (905), Stalingrad (907), and Grozny (1207).
In 1941 only, the instant the Axis Player takes Moscow for the first time -- and also in his VDP of that same turn if he controls it -- he can pick any 2 numbers on the die and roll for immediate victory. Neither chance ever comes again.

V. Strategic options:

• A. Game-start options: The Soviet Player must first decide whether or not to use Option 1.a. or 1. b. or neither of them. The Axis Player may then, if he wishes, choose to use Option 1.b. and/or 2. or neither of them.
  • 1. Nonhistorical redeployment: In all cases, Rumanian units must begin the game in Rumania, and only Hungarian units may start the game in Hungary. The opting player may not take more than 5 minutes to make his redeployment -- the other player then may not take more than 10 minutes to make his -- so these pre-game setup schemes should be thought out and written down in advance as much as possible.
    • a. Soviet strategic redeployment: Only the Soviet Player may choose this option. He may reposition his units -- not factories -- anywhere on his side of the 1941 border. The Axis Player may then redeploy his German units anywhere on his side of the USSR border, outside Hungary. Stalin imposed the historical 1941 "forward stance" dispositions on the Red Army for political motives, so the Soviet Player should be more vulnerable to reproval/removal -- "liquidation?" -- for violating them. Invoking this Strategic Option 1.a. reduces by 1 the victory city requirements of the Axis Player (and increases them by 1 for the Soviet Player) for the entire game.
    • b. Local redeployment: Either player may choose this option.
      • 1) The Soviet Player may redeploy any of his "frontier" units which are adjacent to the 1941 border to any other frontier, hex, as long as each frontier hex is occupied by at least one of his units.
      • 2) The Axis Player may redeploy his undispersed starting forces anywhere on his side of the USSR border, outside Hungary. Any number of German units may now begin the game in Rumania.
      • 3) The set-up sequence is as follows:
        • a) All Axis units starting the game in Rumania are so designated (and, if it was the Axis Player who chose to use this strategic option, these units must be placed in their starting positions at this time).
        • b) The Soviet "frontier" units are now redeployed as described above.
        • c) The Axis Player redeploys the remaining German forces in Germany.
  • 2. Early Axis campaign commencement: The Axis Player may choose to begin the game in the May41 game-turn, instead of the usual Jun41. A weather determination die roll must be made. Rolling an odd number brings Mud in May41; otherwise, the weather is Good. The following units are dispersed at the start of a game begun in May41: The German 2., 11., 16., and 17. (infantry) Field Armies, 4. Panzergroup, and 40. Panzerkorps; and the Soviet 13., 16., 18., 19., 20., 21., 22., 24., 26., 27., and 28. Armies.
• B. The Soviet Siberian Reserves Gambles ("Siberian Roulette") playing option:
  Each year's allotment of Soviet Siberian Reserve reinforcements begins entering the game automatically, and at no risk, in the Replacement/Reinforcement Phase (R/RP) of the January Soviet player-turn of the following year, unless the Soviet Player chooses to begin entering them earlier.
  The 1941 allotment of Soviet Siberian Reserve units consists of 3 consecutive turns of units (of the Soviet Player's choice) having replacement values of 4, 3, and 2 factors respectively. Their "safe" month of beginning automatic arrival is thus Jan42. The 1942 allotment is 2 consecutive turns of units having replacement values of 4 and 2 factors, respectively, with Jan43 being their "safe" beginning arrival month. Any leftover Siberian Reserve reinforcement factors immediately become replacement factors.
  The Soviet Player may risk entering his Siberian Reserve reinforcements earlier, but in each month that they are in the game before their "safe" month, the Axis Player picks a number (from 1 to 6), and the Soviet Player must cast the die. (This should be done at the end of the Soviet R/RP.) If the number cast is the one selected by the Axis Player, the Japanese have invaded the weakened Soviet Far Eastern Military District, and the Axis Player immediately wins the game!

VI. Sequence of play: See Charts and Tables Sheet 1.

VII. Weather determination and effects:

• A. Weather determination: Jun-Sep are automatically Good weather months, and Dec-Feb are automatically Snow weather months. The weather for the other months is determined by the Axis Player's cast of the die (using results cluster X or Y, during the Weather Determination Phase) or by the sequence which results -- shown on Charts and Tables Sheet 2. See Rule V.A.2.
• B. Weather effects:
  • 1. On terrain: In Snow weather months, swamp, lake and river hexes and hex-sides north of the Arctic Weather Line freeze and are treated as clear terrain hexes and hex-sides. This is true for all purposes, except strategic land movement and victory determination.
  • 2. On movement: Weather has no effect on strategic land or sea movement. Mud prevents breakthrough movement. In Snow weather months of the (first) Winter of 1941/42, Axis armor/Panzer units are unable to make breakthrough movement.
  • 3. On combat:
    • a. The Axis Player may use Combat Results Table (CRT) A during all Good weather turns in 1941, during any 3 consecutive Good weather turns of his choice in 1942, during any 2 consecutive Good weather turns of his choice in 1943, and during any 1 Good weather turn of his choice in 1944. CRT B is used otherwise and for all Soviet attacks in any weather.
    • b. In Mud weather turns, CRT B is used for all attacks.
    • c. In Snow weather turns, CRT B is used for all attacks. In any 2 consecutive Snow weather turns of his choice during the (first) Winter of 1941/42, the Soviet Player may increase by a one-column shift (up) to the right on the CRT the final combat odds of any of his attacks on Axis units which are north of the Arctic Weather Line.

VIII. Dispersal:

In GERMAN EAGLE VS. RUSSIAN BEAR, this is a basic function. A unit can be dispersed as a result of combat, at its completion of strategic movement by land or by sea, or upon its (re-)entry into the game as a replacement unit. (A dispersed unit is so indicated by being flipped upside down.)

• A. Dispersed units suffer the following effects:
  • 1. A dispersed unit may not be voluntarily moved during the (remainder of the) owning player's player-turn. A dispersed Soviet defense plant may not produce replacements, entrain, detrain, or move by train.
  • 2. A dispersed unit may not attack or fortify. The combat results against despersed units are read 2 columns higher (than against undispersed units) -- to the right -- on a Combat Results Table. Thus, using Index X on Table A, a die roll of 3 at 3:2 odds against a defending group of Soviet units would instead be read under the 3:1 column (as a DE result, instead of a DR) for any already-dispersed Soviet units in the group.
    Dispersal destroys a fortified unit's fortifications. A dispersed unit's basic defensive strength is unaffected by dispersal, and it may be retreated (and/or dispersed) by combat again in the same player-turn.
• B. All a player's dispersed units (and plants) are recovered to his control -- flipped back face-up -- during his Recovery of Dispersed Units Phase -- even if some of the units had just been dispersed earlier in the same player-turn. EXCEPTION: An armor or front unit having a "Refit/Regroup" marker has the marker removed but remains dispersed and cannot be recovered from dispersal until the recovery phase at the end of the next game-turn.

IX. Strategic movement:
To be moved strategically, a unit must be undispersed. A unit is then dispersed at the end of its strategic movement by land or sea. A unit may not move strategically both by land and by sea in the same Replacement/Reinforcement & Strategic Movement Phase (R/R&SMP).

• A. Strategic land movement:
  • 1. An undispersed unit may move any number of contiguous hexes connected by land and already under friendly control, if it would theoretically be able to make such movement at that instant to the owning player's mapboard edge from any of the hexes traversed. River hex-sides do not obstruct strategic land movement. Open sea, frozen or unfrozen lake, and impassable hex-sides do. (For example, strategic land movement would be possible across hex-sides 203/102 and 204/104, but never across 205/104, 905/1005, the Kerch Straits (1005/1004) or 1107/1108.)
  • 2. In any given R/R&SMP, the Axis Player may strategically move any one Axis unit which is eligible. The Soviet Player may strategically move eligible units having a total replacement value no greater than the total number of emplaced and producing Soviet defense plants -- on or off the mapboard -- which are accessible to strategic movement by land at that moment. See Rule X.A.1.c. below. Each side's limit is called its strategic land movement "capacity."
  • 3. A maximum of 2 units, one of which may be a front, may end its strategic land movement in an eligible major city hex; a maximum of 1 unit of any size may detrain in an eligible minor city or town hex; a maximum of 1 corps or army unit may detrain in any other eligible hex; and no units may ever detrain on a swamp hex which lacks a city or town. A replacement unit which had any of its production points strategically moved by land to that hex does count against this limit.
• B. Strategic sea movement:
  In the Baltic Sea and/or in the Black (including Azov) Sea, a player may move 1 each non-front unit per turn from one friendly coastal hex to another friendly coastal hex on the same sea. To so move, a unit must already be sitting on its embarkation hex at the start of the R/R&SMP. The unit is dispersed and may move no farther upon arriving at its destination/debarkation hex.
  A unit may not sail through the Kerch Straits if either one of the adjacent land hexes (1004 or 1005) is under enemy control. When attempting to sail thorugh a sea under friendly control, a special die roll of 1 by the opposing player eliminates the unit instead. If attempting to sail through a sea under enemy control, any odd number on the special die roll will eliminate the unit.
  Hexes 204, 304, 1006, and 1107 are not considered coastal/port hexes.

X. Replacements and reinforcements:

• A. Replacements: In general, a replacement unit may enter the game on any hex which is within its own country's borders and is accessible to strategic land movement at that instant. Note that the destination hex capacity limits in Rule IX.A.3. (for units strategically moved by land) do apply. (However, a 1-factor Soviet replacement unit created in the same hex as a defense plant would not count against the hex's strategic movement destination hex capacity.)
  A replacement unit is dispersed at its time and place of creation and/or entry into the game. It may not move, fortify, or attack in that player-turn.
  • 1.Soviet replacements:
    • a. A Soviet unit's replacement factor value is its combat factor -- in the case of a shock army, its attack factor of 2-1. Replacement factors may be combined between cities to produce 2- or 3-factor units and/or may be "saved" by the Soviet Player for use in a later game-turn. Beginning in Sep43, a replacement factor may be used to "promote" a 2-factor front to a 3-factor front in any hex, as long as the unit is in supply.
      There may never be more than a total of 14 Soviet front units -- 2- and/or 3-factor -- on the mapboard at the same time.
      
    • b. A replacement factor may be strategically moved by land from its point of production to any other valid replacement unit entry point; however, it consumes its plant's factor of strategic land movement to do so.
    • c. Soviet defense plants:
      • 1) Each active Soviet defense plant accessible to strategic land movement at that instant may produce 1 replacement point in each Soviet Replacement/ Reinforcement(, Fortification,) and Strategic Movement Phase (R/R&SMP).
      • 2) Soviet plants begin the 1941 game on Leningrad, Moscow, Stalino, and Stalingrad, and do not begin production until the second turn of the 1941 game, whether that turn is June or July.
      • 3) A Soviet defense plant is nonproductive any time it is out of supply, dispersed, or entrained. An emplaced plant -- like a fortress -- has a defensive combat strength of 1, but cannot retreat and is eliminated by a DR combat result (as well as by a DE). If entrained, a plant has no combat strength and is eliminated by Axis control of its city/fortress.
        Each complete pair of Soviet defense plants eliminated by the Axis Player reduces by 1 the victory city requirements for the Axis Player (and increases them by 1 for the Soviet Player) for the entire game.
      • 4) Evacuation is a 3-turn process:
        • a) In the R/R&SMP of the first turn of the process, any Soviet defense plant may be entrained or detrained, whether or not it is in or out of supply at that instant.
        • b) In the second turn's R/R&SMP, it may then be strategically moved by land to Siberia or to another city on the mapboard.
        • c) In the third turn's R/R&SMP, the plant can be detrained, but is dispersed and may not actively resume/begin production until the R/R&SMP of the turn following that.
        • d) During each R/R&SMP of the three turns, the evacuation uses up the factory's strategic movement factor.
    • d. Siberian production: Beginning with the second turn of the 1941 game, there is also considered to be an active, emplaced plant in Siberia off the eastern edge of the mapboard. In Apr42, a second Siberian plant completes construction and also begins actively producing in each turn thereafter. In Apr43, a third Siberian plant similarly comes into active production. These plants are in addition to any that were evacuated to Siberia from the mapboard.
    • e. Lend-Lease shipments:
      • 1) Arctic Convoys: On the third game-turn of 1941 and thereafter, Lend-Lease aid may arrive from the Soviet Union's Anglo-American allies. The Soviet Player casts the die. A die roll of 1 produces that many Soviet replacement factors; any other result produces nothing. These factors arrive at Vologda, without counting against any Soviet strategic movement capacity.
        Axis control of Vologda prevents this aid.
      • 2) The Persian Corridor: Similarly, in Apr42, Lend-Lease aid may begin arriving at Grozny -- also without counting against any Soviet strategic movement capacity. A Soviet Player's die roll of 1 or 2 produces that many Soviet replacement factors; any other result produces nothing.
        Axis control of Grozny prevents this aid.
    • f. See Rule XVII.B.1.d. about the Soviet "emergency call-up" reaction to the Axis invasion in 1941.
  • 2. Axis replacements: Any Axis unit which started the game or has already entered the game as a reinforcement is eligible to return to the game as a replacement unit after being eliminated.
    German units return to the game a certain number of game-turns after their elimination. For an infantry army, this number is 2 times its combat factor. For any armor/Panzer unit, the number is 3 times its combat factor. One replacement unit of each type may be rebuilding at a time -- on the Turn Record Track, awaiting re-entry into the game.
    In the R/R&SMP of any May Axis player-turn in 1942 and thereafter, 1 Rumanian army and 1 Hungarian army may return to the game as replacements.
• B. Reinforcements:
  • 1. Unlike replacement units, reinforcement units are not dispersed in (and thus can move and attack immediately after) the R/R&SMP in which they enter the game.
  • 2. A reinforcement unit may enter the game in any area accessible to strategic land movement -- even an otherwise accessible unpopulated swamp hex, in exception to Rule IX.A.3. -- and its entry does not count against the owning player's strategic land movement capacity. Any number of reinforcement units may enter the game on a hex.
  • 3. Soviet reinforcements are Siberian Reserve units and the Polish 1. Army.
  • 4. Axis reinforcements are the II. SS Panzerkorps, I. SS Panzerkorps, and III. SS Panzerkorps which arrive in Feb43, Jul43, and Jan44, respectively. Beginning in Jun43, the German 8. Army becomes available to arrive whenever Kharkov has returned to Soviet control.

XI. Terrain Effects:

• A. On strategic movement: See Rule IX.A. above.
• B. On operational movement: No unit may cross an impassable hex-side, such as an all-sea hex-side or such as borders the three indicated sides of Hex 1107. (EXCEPTION: A unit may make a 1-hex (maximum) operational movement across the Kerch Straits (1004/1005).) An armor-type unit may not make extended or breakthrough movement through or into a mountain hex, across and unfrozen lake hex-side, or across the Kerch Straits.
• C. On combat:
  • 1. Units may not attack into a hex, unless they could operationally move into it at that instant. EXCEPTION: Units may make a 1-hex operational movement -- but not attack -- across an unfrozen lake hex-side.
  • 2. Rivers: If a defending unit is being attacked cross-river by all or enough of the attacking units, the combat odds are reduced by a 1-column shift to the left on the Combat Results Table (CRT). Any such cross-river defensive advantage is nullified, if at least half of the total attacking combat strength participating in the attack is attacking from hexes which are not cross-river.
  • 3. An attack against units defending in hills, mountains, fortresses, or unfrozen swamp must always be made using CRT B. Furthermore, each army- or front-level unit defending in a mountain hex receives 1 additional combat factor. A group of one or more defending army or front units can receive a maximum of 1 additional combat factor, if there are hills or if there is a major city in their hex. (Two units in Hex 1003 could receive 2 bonus factors.) If the major city is on a clear terrain hex defended by Soviet units in Good weather, the attack would still be on CRT A, though. An undefended major city has no defensive factor.
  • 4. In addition to its intrinsic combat factor -- see XII.A. below -- a fortress receives a further terrain benefit -- see 2. above -- if it is being attacked cross-river from a hex to which it is immediately adjacent. (A river on a different side of its hex would give it no such advantage, unless the entire hex, including the fortress, was being attacked across it.)
• D. On supply: Supply may not be traced across an impassable hex-side. Supply can only be traced across an all-sea hex-side if the sea is under friendly control. (Supply can be traced across the Kerch Straits or across lake hex-sides, unfrozen or not.)
• E. Clarifications of terrain and geography:
  • 1. Rivers which run into the middle of hexes (such as 204, 406, and 505) have no effect. (River hex-sides 104/204 and 406/505 would.) Unless it is Snow weather, units attacking Leningrad from 204 do suffer the normal cross-river penalty. See C.2. above. However, units in Leningrad always attack (units in) 204 without suffering the river penalty.
  • 2. Rumanian units may never enter Hungary, and Hungarian units may never enter Rumania -- under penalty of elimination. Similarly, one of these nationalities' units may never enter a hex already occupied by the other's. The Hungarian 2. Army may not leave 601 until May42.
  • 3. German armor/Panzer units may operationally move -- but never attack -- across hex-sides 502/603 and 503/603 north of Kiev.
  • 4. The same unit cannot defend both Tula and Orel. See also C.3. above.
  • 5. Hills are in hexes 304, 701, 1003, 1008, 1106, and 1107. Mountains are in 601, 801, 1205, and 1206.

XII. Fortresses and field fortifications:

• A. Fortresses:
  A fortress on the owning player's side of the 1941 Soviet border has an intrinsic defensive combat strength factor of 1. A fortress must always be attacked on CRT B and can never itself be dispersed. A garrisoning unit which is in a fortress which is also a major city may receive a second bonus factor on defense. See also Rules XI.C.3., XIII.C.2., and XIII.H.
  Only a DE or DR combat result can conquer a fortress. Although it permanently loses its intrinsic defense factor once, conquered, its other benefits are always enjoyed by whichever side's unit occupies it.
  Fortresses can survive isolation and remain in friendly control until actually occupied by an enemy combat unit. Furthermore, they themselves can act as an independent source of supply for any 1 non-front unit, if the normal supply line has been cut. (Moscow can host and isolated front, though.)
  
• B. Field fortifications:
  Any undispersed Axis army or Soviet front unit may be fortified during the owning player's Replacement/Reinforcement & Strategic Movement Phase. Fortification adds 1 factor to the unit's defensive combat strength.
  Logically, a unit forfeits its (field) fortifications -- foxholes -- whenever it moves, attacks, retreats, or is dispersed.
  Fortresses themselves can not be (further) fortified; however, an otherwise eligible unit in one can be fortified.

XIII. Operational movement, attacks, combat resolution, breakthroughs, retreats and advances, and "stacking":

• A. General rules:
  • 1. The owning player may move all, some, or none of his undispersed units during his Operational Movement Phase -- unless prevented by impassable hex-sides or other rules. He must finish moving one (group of) unit(s) before starting to move another. (If necessary, a tournament director may invoke chess rules about moving a "touched" piece.)
  • 2. Unless they are breakthrough units -- see Rule B. below -- units may only operationally move/attack (across passable hex-sides) into an hex immediately adjacent to the one in which it began its turn. See also Rules 7. and B. below.
  • 3. A unit of whatever type may never enter -- let alone pass through -- an enemy-held hex without first attacking and removing from it any enemy combat units (which are not in fortresses).
  • 4. Unless it is eligible to conduct a breakthrough, an individual unit may not attack more than once during any one Attack Phase. (A unit may be attacked more than once in an Attack Phase, though.)
    More than one group -- or "wave" of units may attack across the same hex-side in a combat phase. The combat factors of units which are in the same attack wave but are attacking from different hexes may be combined in their attack against a mutually adjacent enemy-held hex. A breakthrough attack must be made immediately. Its unit(s) may be combined with another initial attack -- but not with breakthrough units from a different initial attack -- against the next hex it is attacking.
    For the Soviets, not more than a total of 2 units may attack across each hex-side in the same attack wave, and not more than 1 of these may be a front unit. Not more than 3 Axis units may attack across each hex-side in the same attack wave. Of these, not more than 2 may be armies, and of these 2 armies not more than 1 may be a Panzergroup/army. Also, not more than 2 of these units may be armor-/Panzer-type. See also Rule C.1. below.
  • 5. If an early wave of attackers cleared the hex of enemy units, then the units of any wave scheduled to attack later may advance on into -- or through, if eligible for armor breakthrough -- the hex as well.
  • 6. An attack wave must attack all defending units in a hex as a combined whole, unless one is in a fortress located along an unengaged hex-side.
  • 7. The Operational Movement "Bonus":
    During initial movement only, if the first hex entered/attacked had no enemy units, fortresses, defense plants, or partisans which had to be eliminated before it could be occupied, any moving non-front unit may move onto a second hex, if that also doesn't require combat to occupy.
• B. Special operational capabilities and liabilities for armored units:
  • 1. Breakthroughs:
    • a. Panzerkorps, Panzergroup/armies, and (eventually) Soviet combined arms armies are eligible for breakthrough in appropriate terrain and Good or -- for German units after the first Winter of 1941/42 and for Soviet units always -- Snow weather.
    • b. If the initial hex(es) entered was (or were) empty of enemy units or had enemy units which were attacked and all eliminated, each breakthrough unit in that attack wave and any following ones may make breakthrough movements and attacks on into a further hex or on an enemy-controlled fortress in the same hex. Panzerkorps and -- during 1941 only -- 2. Panzergroup/army (thanks to "Schnell [Fast] Heinz" Guderian) can break through on a DR result, as well.
      In 1942, othewise eligible Soviet units may breakthrough only if either the initial hex(es) or the breakthrough hex was (or were) empty of enemy units. In 1943 and thereafter, eligible Soviet units have the same breakthrough ability as eligible German ones.
      See Rule A.4. above about combining a breakthrough with a subsequent "normal"/initial attack.
    • c. If an attack was required to attempt to enter the breakthrough hex, and the combat result was a "poor" one -- as described in Rule E. below -- or was a roll of 5 or 6 under the X index (or a 1 or 2 under the Y index) in any case, a "Refit" marker is laid on the breakthrough units. Even without combat -- see Rule A.2. above -- a die roll must be made for each unit entering a breakthrough hex. Upon a 6 under the X index or a 1 under the Y index a breakthrough unit breaks down, moving no further and requiring Refit. Refit is only risked for actually attempting breakthrough -- never for normal/initial operational movement and combat.
  • 2. Armored operational movement supply: If an owning player cannot trace a supply line from one of his armor units back to his fuel source at the start of his OMP, then that unit suffers a "fuel shortage" and cannot make breakthrough movement or attacks. If a battle reopens the fuel lines, then the unit can make breakthrough movement into a second hex -- weather and terrain permitting, of course.
    The Axis fuel source is 801 (Ploesti), and the Soviets' is 1207 (Grozny) -- as indicated by the crude oil wells on the mapboard.
• C. Commitment of units to attack:
  • 1. General rules:
    • a. Except in the case of armor units making breakthrough attacks, no unit may attack more than once in a given Attack Phase. On the other hand, again, a unit may be attacked more than once by different waves of attackers during the same Attack Phase.
    • b. In the same attack or in separate attacks, attackers' units stacked in the same hex may attack stacks of defender's units in more than one different, adjacent hex. See also Rule A.4. above.
    • c. All units participating in normal (non-breakthrough) attacks must be committed to their "avenue of attack" hex-sides (and/or out of the fortress they garrison) in the Attack Allocation Phase before any attacks are calculated and resolved.
    • d. Once committed, Soviet units must attack. Unless the attack was already used to block a potential retreat, Axis units' attacks may be cancelled at any time prior to the die actually being cast -- although those Axis units are then automatically dispersed by their balk and cannot be recommitted in a different direction. See Rule XIII.F. below.
    • e. Other than the following exception concerning fortresses, the defensive combat factors of all units in a hex must be attacked as a combined whole and may not be attacked separately.
  • 2. Special rules concerning fortresses:
    • a. Attacking units are not required to attack a fortress (or its garrison) unless any of them are attacking across the hex-side which it is on or unless the fortress is central to the hex -- as in the case of Warsaw and Moscow. Following, for the record, is a listing of the other fortresses and the hex-sides they are on: Leningrad (104/204), Koenigsberg (301/201), Brest (502/501), Tula (505/406 and 505/506), Kiev (603/604), Stalingrad (907/908), and Sevastopol (1003/903).
    • b. See Rules Illustration #3. Hex B and its fortress (Brest) are occupied by defenders. Any attack including units from A is required to attack the fortress and its garrison and also any defenders in the rest of Hex B. (On the other hand, if the defenders were in Hex A and the fortress, the fortress would have to be taken before any attack on Hex A could include attackers from Hex B.)
      The attacker could choose to attack only from C and/or D just to the defenders of B outside the fortress. (The fortress could be attacked in a breakthrough attack or in a later turn.) In either case, if hex B had been clear terrain in Good weather, the Axis could attack the rest of the defenders in it using CRT A.
      If the attacker controlled the fortress and had a garrison unit there, that unit could attack B independently or as a bonus to the full hex-side complement of attackers coming from A, B, and/or C.
      
• D. Combat odds calculation sequence for an individual attack:
  • 1. Attack factors of all attacking units in a given wave are totalled.
  • 2. Total defenders' defense factors (and include bonus factors for major cities, fortresses, fortifications, hills, mountains, and defense plants).
  • 3. Calculate the "basic" combat odds in the customary manner: the proportion of the attack wave units' total attack factor strength to the defenders' total defense factor strength is matched to an odds ratio on the Combat Results Table (CRT) which is nearest but no greater. EXAMPLES: 5 attack factors to 1 defense factor yields 5:1 odds, 5 to 3 would most match 3:2, and 2 attacking 5 would most match 1:3.
  • 4. Attacks having basic combat odds greater than the maximum allowable ratio are reduced to that ratio before any further modification.
  • 5. Any applicable combat odds column shift modifications (due to invasion surprise, Soviet 1941/42 Winter Offensive, rivers, etc.) are not made, yielding the final combat odds for use with the appropriate CRT on Charts and Tables Sheet 1.
    Note: Units defending in the same hex together could be attacked on different CRTs or under different combat odds, due to terrain, dispersal, etc.
  • 6. Attacks having final combat odds below minimum (1:6) odds automatically eliminate the attacking unit(s) with no effect on the defenders.
  • 7. Choose which die roll index -- X or Y -- to use. Cast a single die. Cross-index the die roll against the appropriate combat results column.
• E. Combat results: A "poor" combat result is any attack which does not result in the attacker's occupation of the attacked hex/fortress.
  • AE = Attacking units (of the Attacker's choice) in this wave, which are at least equal to the factor-modified strength of the defending units, are eliminated. Other surviving attacking units and the defending units suffer no effect.
  • - = No effect. All units remain in their original hexes, undispersed.
  • D = All defending units are dispersed.
  • DR = Defending units are forced to retreat 1 hex and are dispersed, or are eliminated if they cannot. See Rule F. (Fortresses and defense plants are thus conquered/eliminated.)
  • DE = Defending units are eliminated.
• F. Tactical retreats and advances after combat:
  • 1. Tactical retreats and advances must be made immediately after each combat, if they are to be made at all. Both retreated and attacking units -- advancing or not -- lose any fortifications. Retreated units are dispersed.
  • 2. Any Soviet front unit which tactically advances after combat on into an hex must "Regroup" -- See Rule VIII.B. It suffers no such penalty, though, if it is tactically advancing into a fortress in its same hex.
  • 3. The defender may voluntarily retreat his units from a hex or fortress after any nonDR/DE combat result, if he chooses to do so. (Attacking units would then be eligible to advance!) Any "Refit" dispersal -- unless the die roll was 5 or 6 under the X index or 1 or 2 under the Y index -- or loss to attacking units would be nullified if the defender retreated all his units from the attacked hex.
    In this case, the defender can retreat some of his units and leave others behind, as he wishes, and he can retreat different units into different hexes.
  • 4. If a hex is cleared of all defenders by a combat result -- or by voluntary evacuation -- the attacker must advance into it units which are eligible to advance and have total attacking strength factors at least equal to the terrain-modified defending combat factors (or have as many as possible up to that.) Exception: Only one attacking unit is required to advance into a conquered fortress.
  • 5. The defender must retreat his unit(s) into a hex:
    • a. which is adjacent and across a hex-side which he would be allowed to attack across.
    • b. which is already under friendly control.
    • c. which is not under an (as yet unresolved) attack having a potential DE or DR combat result.
    • d. which -- on a DR result -- is not adjacent to any of the hexes form which the unit was attacked, unless the hexes are separated by a hex-side the attacker would not be allowed to attack across.
      Any defending unit unable to retreat is eliminated by a DR combat result.
  • 6. On a DR result, one defending unit may retreat into a fortress in the attacked hex, if the fortress itself is not under attack.
  • 7. Tactical advances after combat by defending units are prohibited.
• G. At the end of the turn, only one side's units may be in the same hex area. However one side's unit may be in a fortress, and the other side's units may be in the rest of the same hex, outside it. A hex cannot be "shared" like this with an enemy unit on a non-fortress major city.
• H. A player may have an unlimited number of units in any one hex area at the end of a turn.
  Only one combat unit of any kind or size -- in addition to a plant -- may be in a fortress at the end of a turn. Excess units are lost.

XIV. Soviet partisans:

During each Soviet Supply Status Determination Phase in 1942, 1943, and 1944, the Soviet Player may cast a die to see whether and how many (more) partisan markers he may place in hex areas. A roll of 1, 1-2, and 1-3, respectively in those years, indicates that the Soviet Player may deploy one partisan marker that month. (Any other result means no additional partisans.)
A Soviet partisan unit may not be put in a hex which is outside the USSR's 1941 borders or already occupied by an Axis unit. It may not be put in a fortress, and an Axis-controlled fortress would remain so, even if its surrounding area falls under partisan control.
Once deployed, a Soviet partisan marker may not be moved strategically or operationally. An area under its control blocks Axis supply, strategic movement, and retreat., as would any other Soviet-controlled hex.
A Soviet partisan marker is immediately and automatically eliminated by an Axis army or SS unit entering its hex and staying there the rest of the turn.

XV. Supply and isolation:

• A. Supply sources:
  For a unit to be in general supply, it must be able to trace a supply line of hexes (under friendly control and joined by hex-sides which could be traversed by a friendly unit's operational or strategic movement at that instant) to the hex it occupies from a friendly supply source hex.
  An Axis unit's supply source hexes are any of the hexes in its own country along the western edge of the mapboard. (Italian units use Rumanian supply source hexes.) A Soviet unit's supply source hexes are any of the hexes along the eastern and southern edges of the mapboard, from 207 down and around to 1206, with the exception of 1107 and 1205.
  A supply line may be traced through a hex under friendly control, even if it contains a fortress under enemy control -- but never across a hex-side blocked by an enemy-controlled fortress.
• B. Isolation effects:
  • 1. Soviet defense plants must be accessible to strategic land movement, not just supply, to be able to produce replacement points. See Rule IX.A.
  • 2. An unsupplied unit may only attack if the combat result would (in conjunction with other attacks, perhaps) give it a chance to get back into supply.
  • 3. An unsupplied unit may not make breakthrough movements and attacks.
  • 4. During the owning player's Supply Status Determination Phase, an of his combat units which are not in supply are eliminated. See also Rule XII.A. Soviet defense plants and partisan markers are not eliminated by isolation.
• C. At any time during the game, the Soviet Player may voluntarily reduce/replace a 2- or 3-factor front unit with a 1-factor combined arms army; however, he loses the strength difference. After the first 1941 game-turn, either player may voluntarily eliminate any of his own units at any time during his own player-turn.

XVI. Control:

• A. Control of the land:
  Control of a land hex and its non-fortress cities or towns or of a fortress is gained by operationally moving (or tactically advancing) a unit into or through it. At the start of the 1941 game, hexes and fortresses are initially under the control of the country within which they are.
• B. Control of the seas:
  The Baltic Sea is controlled by the player who controls Koenigsberg. The Black Sea is controlled by the player who controls Sevastopol. The Sea of Azov is controlled by the player who controls both Sevastopol and Rostov. The Caspian Sea is always under Soviet control.

XVII. Game lengths, scenarios, and orders-of-battle/set-ups:

• A. Length of game:
  • 1. A tournament game runs until one player achieves his victory conditions or -- after an agreed turn -- until either player stops the game at the very beginning of one of his player-turns (at which time a player wins if he meets his victory conditions at that moment).
  • 2. A campaign game runs from whatever scenario's game-start month until one player or the other wins. If the Soviet Player has not achieved victory by the end of Sep44 Axis Player-turn, the Axis Player wins. A game may be ended by mutual consent at any time.
• B. Scenarios:
  • 1. May/Jun41: Fall Barbarossa/Operation Barbarossa. See also Rule V.A.
    • a. Rumanian units cannot move/attack from Rumania until the second game-turn. The Hungarian army is similarly inactive until May42.
    • b. Throughout the first Axis Player-turn, all attacks' final combat odds (on whichever CRT) are increased by a 1-column shift right.
    • c. In the first turn, only 1 Soviet unit may be moved strategically by land. However, strategic sea movement is as usual.
    • d. During the first turn, Soviet defense plants cannot produce replacements or be entrained. Instead, there is an "emergency call-up" of replacements which consist of all eliminated or isolated armies which may be immediately reintroduced (dispersed) into the game at a maximum of one per major Soviet city -- not Riga or Talinn -- under Soviet control and in overland supply. See also Rule XV.C. above.
    • e. The last compulsory game-turn is Mar42.
  • 2. Jun42: Fall Blau/Operation Blue.
    • a. The Stalino defense plant has been transferred to Siberia -- all others are still in their original positions -- and the second Siberian plant has come into production in this and all subsequent scenarios.
    • b. The last compulsory game-turn is Dec42.
  • 3. Nov42: Operation Uranus.
    • a. This scenario begins with the Soviet Player-turn of Nov42.
    • b. The Stalingrad plant has been destroyed. See also Rule 2.a. above.
    • c. The last compulsory game-turn is Jun43.
  • 4. Jul43: Fall Zitadelle/Operation Citadel.
    • a. See Rules 2.a. and 3.b. above. The third Siberian plant is active.
    • b. The last compulsory game-turn is Apr44.
  • 5. Jun44: Operation Bagration -- The Destruction of Army Group Center.
    • a. This scenario begins with the Soviet Player-turn of Jun44.
    • b. See Rules 2.a. and 3.b. above about active Soviet defense plants.
    • c. See Rule A.2. above for game length.
• C. Orders of battle -- i.e., "setups" -- See the scanned setup sheets.

12Apr09